IT says much about the quality of Middlesbrough’s performances so far this season that is has taken until the 14th game of the campaign for their players to produce a display where it could justifiably be claimed that they let themselves down. Last term, such occurrences were alarmingly commonplace.

The opening-day defeat at Watford came when squads were still settling down and the footballing world remained in a state of flux. This month’s home reverse to Norwich was a tale of two penalties that could easily have swung in Boro’s favour. So, it has taken until the end of November, and Saturday’s trip to Huddersfield, for Neil Warnock’s team to end up on the wrong side of a result for which there were really no excuses. Having overperformed for much of the last two months, Boro’s players have earned the right to have an off day.

With the Championship bandwagon rolling on remorselessly as Swansea prepare to visit the Riverside on Wednesday, there will be no time for stewing on Saturday’s setback. Pick yourself up, dust yourself down, get back in the saddle. As Warnock rightly reflected on Saturday night, every Championship team will suffer bumps in the road between now and May.

“What do I put it down to? I haven’t got a clue to be honest,” said the Boro boss, in his post-match Zoom call. “You might as well have a guess…”

Here goes then. Boro suffered their third league defeat of the season at Huddersfield’s John Smith’s Stadium for two main reasons, one of which is a long-standing issue and the other which is hopefully a one-off.

Missing chances has been an issue all season, indeed it could be argued it was a handicap long before Warnock arrived to replace Jonathan Woodgate in the summer.

Boro were completely dominant in the opening half-hour at the weekend, pressing Huddersfield high up the field, repeatedly turning over possession, and springing effectively to launch counter-attacking raids into the opposition box.

Marvin Johnson opened the scoring with a crisp driven finish after bright approach play from Marcus Tavernier, but there were enough other opportunities before the half-hour mark for the visitors to have put the game out of sight. Instead, they came up with increasingly elaborate ways to avoid finding the net.

Often, it was a case of poor decision-making, with Johnson, Tavernier and Assombalonga all wasting promising positions with a misplaced pass, a cross too close to the goalkeeper or an ill-advised shot when team-mates were in better positions.

Assombalonga shot into the side-netting when he had at least two fellow forwards screaming for the ball alongside him early on, but that was nothing compared to the 11th-minute incident that would have merited its own section on a Christmas bloopers compilation were we still living in the era of VHS.

It looked impossible for Assombalonga to miss when he slid in to meet Johnson’s low cross into the six-yard box, but despite being no more than two yards out when he made contact with the ball, the Boro skipper somehow contrived to divert the ball over the crossbar.

The level of Assombalonga’s effort and commitment has been unquestionable since he was handed the captain’s armband, but the fact Saturday’s successful second-half penalty means he still only has three league goals to his name this season speaks volumes. Adam Armstrong, the Championship’s leading goalscorer, has 13. Ivan Toney, Brentford’s attacking talisman, has scored 12. If Boro had anyone capable of coming close to rivalling those numbers, they would be a completely different proposition.

“That’s when you have to win the game,” said Warnock. “The game should have been put to bed and over in the first half-hour. You don’t get chances like we had and not be two or three up. It’s a big disappointment really. It gave them the opportunity (to get back into the game), and to go in at half-time 2-1 down was an absolute travesty.”

Boro found themselves behind at the break because they were unable to take their chances, but also because a second failing became apparent towards the end of the first half, namely that their early dominance disappeared as they became much more passive and flat. That marked tapering of performance level became even more acute in the second half, with errors creeping in as a result.

As the game wore on, so Boro’s intensity withered away. Instead of closing down eagerly, the visitors began to stand off their opponents, inviting them to attack. Their defence, which has been the bedrock of their impressive start to the season, became uncharacteristically creaky, and they ended the afternoon having conceded three goals in a league game for the first time since the penultimategame of last season, when they finished against Cardiff with ten men.

Carel Eiting scored Huddersfield’s equaliser in the 37th minute, making the most of a pocket of space on the edge of the area as he swept a low shot past Marcus Bettinelli’s left hand, and Carlos Corberan’s home side claimed the lead on the stroke of half-time with an especially sloppy goal from a Boro perspective.

George Saville was dispossessed in the centre-circle, enabling Lewis O’Brien to break. The Huddersfield midfielder found Fraizer Campbell, and with Boro’s defenders unable to get close to him, the former Sunderland striker swivelled and scuffed home a scruffy finish.

“When you make mistakes, you get punished. I don’t think the talking was correct. For one of the goals, Paddy (McNair) is telling Dael (Fry) to take one of them, but it didn’t happen. It’s a lack of communication, really, in certain situations. I can’t really fault them for effort, they put a shift in. It’s just disappointing to concede goals like that when we’ve done really well with the defending of late.”

Having huffed and puffed their way through the second half, Boro were handed a lifeline with seven minutes left. Jonny Howson’s perfectly-weighted through ball released Assombalonga into the area, and after Naby Sarr felled the striker with a clumsy sliding challenge, Assombalonga picked himself up to stroke his spot-kick into the top corner.

That should have been the cue to shut up shop and accept a point, but just two minutes later, Huddersfield were celebrating what proved to be their winner.

With the Boro defence at sixes and sevens as their opponents swept upfield, Josh Koroma stepped inside Anfernee Dijksteel in the 18-yard box before curling an excellent finish past Bettinelli.

“I would like to have made a change at 2-2, but we didn’t have time because they went right down and scored again,” bemoaned Warnock.

“That was disappointing, the way it came about, without picking on individuals. But that’s life I’m afraid.”

It is certainly life in the Championship. Saturday’s defeat was an unexpected setback, but it was hardly a disaster. Boro’s challenge now, ahead of tricky-looking meetings with Swansea and Stoke in the space of four days, is to prove their first backward step of the season was a blip rather than a sign of anything more worrying.